Boss John, it is your time to shine like a star, quickly fly to US and catch this Tiongkok CheeBai Billionaire back for your boss to POFMA him

[k1976]

Commentary: Singapore must stand together to combat the likes of Guo Wengui and his disinformation network​

The modus operandi of Guo’s social media accounts illustrates how hostile information operations have become a growing threat to countries and governments around the world, says the Singapore Institute of International Affairs’ Nicholas Fang.

File photo of Guo Wengui's social media page in August, 2017. Singapore has directed five social media platforms to block nearly 100 social media accounts linked to Guo under its foreign interference law. (AP Photo/Andy Wong, File) …

 

[k1976]

SINGAPORE: Singapore’s announcement on Friday (Jul 19) that it has invoked its foreign interference law to block 95 social media accounts linked to a self-exiled Chinese billionaire is significant for a number of reasons.

First, it marks the first time that the account restrictions directions under Foreign Interference (Countermeasures) Act (FICA) is being deployed since the law was passed in October 2021.

Second, it casts a spotlight on the murky world of information operations and hostile influence campaigns that have become a growing threat to countries and governments around the world.

The man at the centre of the accounts is Guo Wengui, a critic of China’s Communist Party who fled to the United States in 2015. He was found guilty in the US earlier this week for stealing hundreds of millions of dollars from his online followers.

Singapore’s Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said the directions were issued after the network was identified and found to have disseminated disinformation across multiple social media and digital platforms.

This disinformation included allegations that Singapore is "in the pocket of a foreign actor", who was "behind the scenes in the selection of Singapore’s fourth-generation leader”, MHA said.

 

[k1976]

Chinese tycoon Guo Wengui lived in a lavish New York penthouse after he fled China. (Photo: AFP/Timothy A Clary)

BROADER IMPLICATIONS​

The latest deployment of FICA has raised eyebrows given the number of accounts in question, plus the provenance of the potential disinformation, leading to questions about the possible intention behind the network.

The decision to block the accounts was taken after it was assessed that they could be used to launch hostile information campaigns in Singapore, at a time when the country is undergoing a leadership transition and could face general elections, which must be called by November next year.

But for those who study and monitor information operations and interference campaigns around the world, it is clear that Guo’s network is not the largest to have been deployed.

Just earlier this month, the US Justice Department said it had disrupted a Russian operation that used fake social media accounts enhanced by artificial intelligence to covertly spread pro-Kremlin messages in the US and abroad.

The news comes four months before the US presidential election, which security experts widely believe will be the target of both hacking and covert social media influence attempts by foreign adversaries. Some 1,000 social media accounts were allegedly associated with the operation, significantly more than those identified in the Guo network and a good wake-up call for Singaporeans as to the potential scale of such a threat.